To the child who stole from me;

When I caught you with your hands in my desk drawer, I got angry.  When I asked what you were doing and a series of lies poured  frantically out of your mouth one after another, I got furious.

Don't you understand that I give everything to you and your classmates?  90% of my day I spend with you, worrying about you, planning things to do with you, or talking about you.  I spend my money and time all on YOU.  You have become a part of my life.  I do everything I can to help you learn and grow both academically and emotionally.

I trust you.  I put books out in the room and let you borrow them and take them home.  I leave my purse in a cabinet.  I have stickers and candy and a camera in my desk drawer.  I leave my laptop in the room when you are here. I trust you not only because you are a child, but because we are a team. 

Then, when your hands are in my desk taking something of mine and I see you in the act of stealing and yet you have the guts to lie to my face about what you did, everything is turned upside down.  I sent you out in the hall to sit because I couldn't look at you right then.  I felt disgusted.  I felt angry.  I felt...betrayed.  By you.  A little girl.  I trusted you and your classmates.   

I let you wait until the end of the day before we talked.  I admit, part of me wanted you to think about what you did.  But another part of me knew that if I talked to you before then, I'd yell.  After school, I wanted you to tell me why you did what you did.  Yet again, the excuses poured from your mouth as fast as the tears down your cheeks: "I found it," "I was going to put it back," "I didn't mean to," "I didn't do it," "I was borrowing it."  You couldn't explain why.  I sent you home to explain what you did to your parents, knowing that that would be punishment enough.

The next day, you apologized.  We chose a logical consequence.  You accepted it.  You looked at me, still teary, and I saw how young you are.  You became not just a child who stole but a child who would do anything to earn my trust back.  When I told you that you had broken my trust, I meant it.  When I told you we could move on, I meant that too.

I am still your teacher.  I still care deeply about you.  I still will make your education my priority and still lose sleep, worrying that I'm not doing enough for you.  We will forget about this.  I am not angry anymore.  But I will still wonder sometimes if leaving my ipod in my desk is a mistake.  I will still wonder sometimes if I should keep better track of which books you and your classmates take home at night, and check that you brought them back.

You reminded me that it's as important to teach morals and character in school as reading and math.  Sometimes it's easier to say, "Oh, the kids will learn that at home.  It's not my job."  But what happens to the kids that don't learn those things at home?  If it's not my job, then whose is it?

what, you don't find the temperature in here quite comfortable?

Why being the teacher is sometimes better than being the student:

I have control over the temperature in the room. So. Much. Power.

Student: "Miss Teacher, I'm so cold! It's freezing in here!"
Teacher says: "That's too bad, remember to bring a jacket!"
Teacher means: "Really...I'm quite comfortable. I'm running up and down the stairs 50 times a day, standing in front of a hot copier, and then doing a song and dance up at the front of the room to get your attention! I need it a little cool in here. Deal with it!"

Just kidding...but only kind of :)

grr mondays...

Dear Kids,

Please talk less tomorrow. Please. You're making me crazy.

Thanks,

Miss Teacher

you know you're a teacher when...

...you spend way too much money at target on stickers, colored pens, individually wrapped candy, decorative pencils, and miscellaneous little notebooks and stamps from the dollar bin...

drumroll, please...

...I think I actually enjoyed teaching this week!

Aside from being sick this week, things went very well, and I finally feel like I have figured some things out! I guess I should clarify: I am still making things up as I go along and 90% of the time I am confused, but a lot of things are feeling better. For example, shared reading went really well this week. Maybe it was because I was so interested in the topic, or maybe it's because we have gotten into a good routine, but things just felt better. Easier, more relaxed, and more, well, successful. So yay!

There are still a million things I'm figuring out, and everyday another thing gets added. For example, at my postobservation meeting with the principal, he asked how I'm helping my tier 3 (lowest) kids in preparation for boosting ISAT scores. My response: ummm....
And now that we're switching for math, I have to start getting into a whole new routine with my new math class. But, I feel less lost than I did a few weeks ago. I haven't cried lately, and I've enjoyed some things at school. I feel like I've been building a good rapport with most of my students, and am continuing to work on getting to know each one separately (which is hard--I am constantly thinking about which students I am neglecting or letting fall through the cracks, and I feel terrible about this). Things are getting better. Thank goodness.

In other news, Parent conferences are this week: yikes!! I'm terrified...

On that note, I better get back to my grading. But first, here're a few more words to teach by:

A child is not a vessle to be filled, but a lamp to be lit.
Hebrew proverb

my 1st observation, or, "shooting for the stars in literacy" ;)

Today was my first time being observed by my principal--oh the excitement. I am one of the most anxious people on the planet (ok, exaggerating a little, but only a little) and really tend to freak out before things like this. However, this morning I was able to calm down, remembering that my WORST teaching happens when I am nervous (flashbacks to the lesson I taught when I interviewed here! yikes...). Thankfully, the lesson went really great. The kids were on task (maybe the principal should observe every day?), they participated, and we had a great time. And, MOST exciting for me was that the kids FINALLY got interested in the subject matter!
Our reading theme for the week is space (my favorite!!!!), and Monday when I introduced it, I asked the kids who thought they might want to be an astronaut when they grew up. Guess how many hands shot into the air?

ZERO.

That's right, zero. I had to practically hold back my tears! I would have spent a MONTH on space, reading and writing about it, but thanks to my friendly literacy series, I must test and move on every week. :-/ Anyways, so my big goal was for them to get at least a little interested in space by the end of the week. Today I think I got my proof--some of them seemed to think the whole idea was pretty cool! Not sure if I have any budding Aldrins or Armstrongs, but I still have another 8 months to pound it into their heads. :)

Anyways, back to the observation. I managed to stay calm and was pleased with how it went. Even my challenging little buddy stayed on task and participated (our MORNING was great today, the end of the day unraveled...). When he left after the observation, he even left a note on my desk telling me I did a great job and that I have definitely built a relationship with my kids. Maybe he's not regretting hiring me after all...well, not yet. Maybe after ISATs...

Well, I made it through another week. Now I have to frantically get some more grades in the gradebook and get ready for conferences next week! I am literally petrified of parent conferences. I know that for the most part I don't have scary parents, but still...I hate that, "You're so young!" stare and "But, do you have children yourself? So, you don't understand, do you" comment... oh well.

1 sick day down

Well, I'm definitely glad I took everyone's advice and took a sick day today. There is no way I would have made it through a day of school the way I felt all day! I went to bed last night at 8:30 and slept until 11:30 this morning. Then I took two more naps during the afternoon, and still am completely exhausted and ready for bed at 8:15 tonight. Yikes. I hope I have more energy tomorrow!

It was nice to catch up on sleep, and after pumping my body full of vitamins, I am sincerely hoping this cold is on its way out. Even though I left very detailed subplans, my sub still had a few curve balls thrown at her today it turns out! I woke up at 5am remembering that Tuesday is band/orchestra lessons day, and I forgot to post the schedule on the board. Oops! I'm hoping the kids checked the schedule at home before school like they're supposed to, and found their way to lessons without my reminder. They are, afterall, fifth graders... :) Also, this afternoon we were supposed to have one of our biweekly community meetings with the social worker, but it turns out those are starting NEXT week...soo I hope the sub was able to come up with something to do with them for that half hour!

I know that teachers tend to fall into the self-righteous trap of thinking that the world will come crashing to a halt (or at least the school day) if we're not there, but I'm so glad that I took today to take care of myself. Hopefully nobody died and according to my neighbor teacher, there were no screams or anything from the next room! Phew. While still tired, I am feeling much better than I did this morning, although I seem to have developed a nice deep, attractive cough... :-/

A half gallon of v8 spash and a box of tylenol cold later, I am heading back to school tomorrow, cough or no cough!

zinc, vitamin c, and kleenex, oh my

Well, looks like tomorrow is going to be sick day #1 for this stuffed up first year teacher. They all told me I'd catch every illness under the sun this first year. Hopefully this one's just a cold. I should have known when my guided reading group members actually needed to bring the whole kleenex box over to our table Friday...I had every intention of sticking it out and getting through the week, but today after school my mentor convinced me to take the day off tomorrow. She's right, one day of rest will hopefully make all the difference, whereas going to school would make this cold drag out nice and long.

Anyways, at 8:23pm it's off to bed for me... :(

(good thing i finally registered with subfinder this morning...)

bleh

Ughhhh....I feel like death. My cold is definitely not better today, and all I want to do is get back in bed and sleep for days. But, it's off to school I go...more zinc and tylenol cold it is...

Note to self: register for subfinder just in case...

highs and lows: made it through another week!

I made it through another week :) And things did get better as the week went on. This will just be a brief recap because it's after midnight (I can hardly remember the days when I used to stay up until 4 or 5...), and I'm getting sick. Thanks, kids. Thanks.

Anyways. Monday was a tough day. One of my challenging students gave me hell all morning and then when I kept him in at lunch to discuss, snapped at me and really just pissed me off. During lunch I almost cried and seriously didn't want to go back to my classroom. Then, the kids were crazy chatty and that was about the last straw. Thankfully, Mrs. J helped me come up with a new seating arrangement, a new motivating behavior plan, and a new perspective. My kids now have table names (peace in different languages--the goal is a "peaceful classroom," but we'll start with that!) and earn table points. So far it is highly motivating. Let's hope it lasts! Miss R (school miss r, not iwu) and I enjoyed some much needed margaritas and chips at our friendly neighborhood Chili's and vented about school and the kids for a good hour and a half after we finally left the building. As much as I hate complainers, I'm realizing how absolutely necessary it is to just vent once in a while with someone who truly understands what you are going through. I swear, if I didn't have another first year teacher in the building who is feeling just as lost as me most of the time, I would lose it.

Well, Tuesday I came in with high hopes and high expectations. Thankfully, the new system helped, and we proceeded to have a great rest of the week. The fish didn't die, I didn't have pink eye afterall, and I made it through with no more tears. Just the regular old stress, perfectionism, and emotionalness that this teaching thing makes me feel! I even survived curriculum night! Thank goodness my school decided to shake things up this year and turn curriculum night into a student-led scavenger hunt through the classroom and building rather than a teacher presentation that so often turns into a parent interrogation. The night was fun and the parents were nice. Phew!
Some highs and lows from the week:

Highs:
-a curriculum night that actually turned out to be a lot of fun
-surviving Friday's "soft lockdown" (thanks, escaped prisoner who hijacked a car on the street next door to my school!) with no significant problems
-the fish NOT dying!!! (note to self: model, model, model the correct procedures for feeding the fish...)
-having the kids love the new book bins that we set up for them this week and seeing how excited they were to discover new books
-some of the kids actually doing really well on their math tests yesterday--no tears while grading! yay!
-finally making it down to the teachers lounge for lunch a couple days this week
-having my student show me the correct way to "finger skateboard" (see right) and having the kids cheer when I correctly executed a "trick"
-grading some really beautiful letters in reading response journals today about my students' "something beautiful"
-Introducing Daily 5 read to self and having it go AMAZINGLY (to be blogged about soon!)
-dancing the Cupid Shuffle with the class--best "stretch break" ever.

Lows:

-Monday (and almost everything about it)
-writing up one of my kids for the third time
-feeling about one step behind everyone on my team all the freaking time
-getting to school at 5:45 one morning last week, and still be scrambling at the bell to have my act together
-leaving school Wednesday and Thursday right away to go do autism therapy/babysit, and coming BACK to school after, not to leave again until 8pm...
-getting this cold...

Let's hope next week is even less stressful...*fingers crossed*